CHAPTER THE FIFTY-NINTH.

Ascyltos was just starting in to answer this indictment when Trimalchio, who was delighted with his fellow-freedman's tirade, broke in, "Cut out the bickering and let's have things pleasant here. Let up on the young fellow, Hermeros, he's hot-blooded, so you ought to be more reasonable. The loser's always the winner in arguments of this kind. And as for you, even when you were a young punk you used to go 'Co-co co-co,' like a hen after a rooster, but you had no pep. Let's get to better business and start the fun all over again and watch the Homerists." A troupe filed in, immediately, and clashed spears against shields. Trimalchio sat himself up on his cushion and intoned in Latin, from a book, while the actors, in accordance with their conceited custom, recited their parts in the Greek language. There came a pause, presently, and "You don't any of you know the plot of the skit they're putting on, do you?" he asked, "Diomedes and Ganymede were two brothers, and Helen was their sister; Agamemnon ran away with her and palmed off a doe on Diana, in her place, so Homer tells how the Trojans and Parentines fought among themselves. Of course Agamemnon was victorious, and gave his daughter Iphigenia, to Achilles, for a wife: This caused Ajax to go mad, and he'll soon make the whole thing plain to you." The Homerists raised a shout, as soon as Trimalchio had done speaking, and, as the whole familia stepped back, a boiled calf with a helmet on its head was brought in on an enormous platter. Ajax followed and rushed upon it with drawn sword, as if he were insane, he made passes with the flat, and again with the edge, and then, collecting the slices, he skewered them, and, much to our astonishment, presented them to us on the point of his sword.